Wedding Wednesday – Behind the Bride – Fiona

This week’s Behind the Bride is with the lovely Fiona, from Dorset Mums, who I have had the pleasure of meeting this summer.

Hello Fiona, so when was the big day?

17 September 2011.

Tell me a bit about yourself and your partner. When and where did you first meet?

We first met in summer 2009 on Poole Quay when we were crewing for different pleasure boat companies. After work many of the crew would socialise in the pub and one day Carl asked me out for dinner.

How did they propose? Or was it you who popped the question?

Carl proposed when we were on holiday in Turkey. We had gone on an islands cruise and on one of the islands Carl suggested we walk to the top where he got down on one knee.

Tell me a bit about your big day. Where did you tie the knot? Did you have a theme or a colour scheme?

We looked at many wedding venues including castles and hotels but we decided we’d rather try and do it ourselves to save money so we had a big church wedding followed by the reception at a very pretty village hall in Morden.

We had a seaside theme with fish and chips and Mr Whippys for dessert, rock favours and a big sandcastle wedding cake.

I didn’t want to pay for overpriced hotel wine or corkage charges which is one reason why I chose the village hall as we could buy our own. Myself and a bridesmaid spent many a Friday night taste testing the wine and several times I had to keep replacing bottles before the big day haha. I tried to do as much as I could myself but we splurged on a few luxuries like my VW camper to the church and Carl’s arrival with the best men by speed boat up the Wareham river.

What was your favourite memory from your day?

I was a nervous wreck for most of the day. My favourite memory is probably late in the evening when me and Carl got to relax and enjoy ourselves with a drink and a dance.

My funniest memory is after the reception. We had an amazing huge bath in a hotel and I didn’t know it had a jacuzzi function so I emptied a bottle of bubble bath and we went to drink champagne on the balcony while it was running. When we opened the bathroom door there were bubbles everywhere!

Was there anything that didn’t go to plan? Or that you would perhaps have done differently?

Everything went very smoothly and I loved our day but part of me wishes we’d saved more and had somewhere where we could of hired the land and made a whole weekend of it with camping and a festival atmosphere. I felt like I didn’t have the chance to speak to many people.

Do you have any advice for future brides to be?

Make sure you take some time out in the day to just go off somewhere and have a drink with your husband. The day goes so quickly and it’s easy to miss everything that’s going on around you.

Thank you so much for sharing your special day with us, Fiona! If you would like to hear more from Fiona, please do visit her blog, or you can find her on social media – Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

If you would like to be featured in the Behind the Bride series, please send me an email to discuss.